THE BROKER OF THE FUTURE WINNING IN A DISRUPTIVE ENVIRONMENT

Disruptive business models are overturning long-held orthodoxies about the role of the insurance industry’s middlemen. Data and analytics will soon be able to determine risk and insurance program structures and identify the best carriers for specific risks more accurately and more quickly than the most highly experienced broker. Remaining truly relevant in the new, a digitized insurance ecosystem requires traditional brokers to become brokers of the future: digitally sophisticated, and, by focusing more on strategic risk advice, able to deliver the transparency and control that today’s customers need.

Key Findings

As digital disruption intensifies, brokers will need to protect and defend their core business while launching new, value-creating strategies.

It’s worse than you think. By 2020, Accenture Strategy estimates that disruptive models and digital platforms could account for as much as 15-20 percent of the SME market, and revenues from broking for mid-sized and large customers could erode by up to 20 percent.

Disrupt early to gain first mover advantage. Eighty-four percent of executives at insurers agree that traditional organizations must evolve their business before they are disrupted. That means brokers also need to change. And if they move fast, they could reap significant rewards by setting new product and service offering standards.

Platforms beat products. Some 83 percent of insurance executives expect platform-based business models to become part of their growth strategy over the next three years, and 81 percent say platforms will bring organizations together in the digital economy.